Harry Humphrey Van Gorden was born on February 2, 1881, to Schuyler and Clara Van Gorden. Schuyler owned a General Store in Hixton, Wisconsin, where Harry worked up until 1902, when he married Mary Ellen ‘Nellie’ McCullough and they opened a store together in Fenwood, Wisconsin. The couple would have three sons: Archie ‘Red,’ Bruce, and Kenneth between 1903-1905. After their store in Fenwood burned down, they bought a General Store in Alma Center, Wisconsin in 1908 which they would run until 1930. They also bought the Feed Mill in town in the 1920s. By the 1930s, Harry and his sons would own four Feed Mills in four different cities under the firm “H.H. Van Gorden & Sons” before Harry sold out of the business in 1939 and bought the Texaco bulk plant and station in Eau Claire that same year. Harry writes in his diary about some of the struggles he experienced with running his Texaco stations during the war as gas was rationed and he was shorthanded, having to do much of the work himself at 60 years old, as all the young men were going off to war. Harry would sell his Texaco business in 1945 and he and Nellie moved to Merrillan, Wisconsin, where they lived until 1951 when they moved to Neillsville, Wisconsin. Harry died on October 21, 1956, in Neillsville at age 75.

Archie Humphrey ‘Red’ Van Gorden was born on April 11, 1903 in Hixton, Wisconsin. He married Hazel Madeline Fremstad on July 10, 1924. The couple had three children together: Richard (born in 1925), Heron (born in 1926), and Cyrena (born in 1928). Red worked for his father until he bought the Feed Mill in Neillsville, Wisconsin in 1929. He joined the National Guard in Neillsville in 1940 and was called into Federal Service in October when his unit was sent to a camp in Louisiana for training. Red, joined by Hazel while Harry and Nellie looked after their kids still in Neillsville, remained in Louisiana until he was sent to Australia in April 1942. He would serve in Australia and New Guinea until 1943. He tried to return to the family Feed Mill business that his brother Kenneth had maintained while he was serving but found it too difficult to work in the cold weather. Red and Hazel moved to Florida in 1946 where they ran a motel until they retired in 1958. The couple would primarily live in Florida for the rest of their lives but would return to live in Wisconsin during the warmer months. Red suffered a stroke on September 27, 1981, and died on October 8 in Neillsville at the age of 78.